Labor, civic and patient groups have denounced the government’s decision to reverse the medical schools’ admissions quota for the 2026 academic year back to three-thousand-58 students and called for the decision’s withdrawal. 

The Korea Alliance of Patients Organization said in a statement on Thursday that the medical community’s assertion that the government cannot triumph over doctors has proved to be true. 

The group said it is devastated by the government’s decision, adding that it had trusted the government when it vowed to revive essential and regional medical services by expanding the admissions quota and pursuing medical reforms. 

A group representing patients with serious illnesses urged the education ministry to scrap its decision, calling it a national scam. 

The Korea Health and Medical Workers' Union expressed woes that the government's decision will slow down the momentum for medical reforms while the Citizens' Coalition for Economic Justice stressed the need for the government to pursue, by all means, health care reforms even in the face of dissention from doctor groups.